Let’s Talk: Star Wars Day!

Happy Star Wars Day, nerd lovers! I know I owe you a Star Wars Celebrations report, and that will be forthcoming, complete with pictures and everything (and only a few weeks late). But in the meantime, today we are going to talk about some of the exciting things that are happening in the Star Wars universe, all of which were announced at Celebrations.

Episode 8: The Last Jedi Trailer

The first Episode 8 trailer dropped at Celebrations and the hype is strong with this one. You may or may not have caught your nerd watching it on loop on YouTube. You can view it here:

Lots to digest, I know. And your nerd has possibly (probably) spent weeks dissecting it and theorizing with his or her nerd buddies about what all this amazing footage could possibly mean for the movie. Luckily for all of you, I’m here to summarize a few things:

Rey is clearly being trained in the ways of the Force by Luke Skywalker.

Finn looks like he’s not in great shape.

Poe Dameron gets his ships exploded a lot.

Princess Leia is in the film.

Kylo Ren still looks like an emo, whiny little Sith, very much the spiritual successor of his grandfather, sand-hating Anakin Skywalker. Pre-Vader, obviously. Because Vader was bad ass.

The trailer ends with Luke saying, “It’s time for the Jedi to end.” What?! What could possibly have happened to make Luke Skywalker want to end the Jedi? Did he turn to the dark side? And how big of a twist would that be? Or does he maybe mean it in more of a “I’m not religious, but I am spiritual sort of ways.” As in, maybe we don’t need to have all these strict dogmas. Maybe we should just trust in the force and use it for good or something.

Star Wars Cartoon News

It was announced that Season 4 will be the final season of Rebels. Will it end with a lead in to the Battle of Scarif (which we covered in the Rogue One recap)? Who knows? The trailer dropped along with the announcement and it looks like it should be an exciting final season.

A new Star Wars cartoon, Forces of Destiny, was also announced. This will be first released on Disney’s YouTube channel before eventually being released on tv. The series will tell short, animated stories about various female characters from all Star Wars time periods. Here are some of the characters announced for the series.

Rey – Lightsaber wielding Episode 7 heroine of mysterious parental origin. Oh wait, I forgot to mention. They said Episode 8 will address the question of Rey’s parentage in the movie! Your nerd may have spent tons of times theorizing about this as well. Lots of people think she’s a Skywalker, probably Luke’s. But other people have theorized she could be Obi Wan’s, a granddaughter of Palpatine, a female clone of Anakin Skywalker… there’s a lot out there. Ask your nerd which theory they believe.

Jyn Erso – Heroine of Rogue One. This story obviously takes place before Rogue One because it would be impossible for it to take place after. (Because she dies in Rogue One)

Star Wars Battlefront 2

The new Star Wars Battlefront game was also revealed at celebrations. The sequel to the financially successful first game Star Wars Battlefront: The $100 mistake that all nerds made. And despite the general disappointment of the first game, the follow up looks sufficiently interesting enough that many nerds are probably going to be excited to waste their money again. The coolest thing about this was the announcement of a single player campaign, where the player will be playing as an Imperial soldier. Here’s the trailer.

And that was all the biggest news from Celebrations. Hope this gets you caught up with everything your Star Wars nerd has been talking about. May the 4th be with you.

Michelle Waller

This is so much awesome Start Wars News! My whole family can’t wait to see The Last Jedi in theatres this Christmas. It will be sad to see the end of Rebels. My kids would love to watch Forces of Destiny as they are big YouTube watchers and love the ladies of this series.

Tiara Wilson

I’ve never really heard the saying “May the Fourth be with you” until this year. I think it’s amazing that they celebrate a Star Wars day. I wouldn’t have ever thought that it was thing until now! So cool! Thanks for sharing!